Eduardo Marbán, MD, PhD, is a cardiologist and a scientist.  In his research career, Marbán, a cellular electrophysiologist by training, has pursued questions of relevance to heart disease, including the creation of the first de novo biological pacemaker as an alternative to electronic pacemakers. Since 2004 the Marbán lab has been intensively studying cardiac progenitor cells, their origins and their therapeutic potential. The basic work has come full circle in that Marbán’s cardiac-derived cell products form the basis for 7 clinical trials, including an ongoing phase 3 registration trial (HOPE-3) in Duchenne muscular dystrophy. A major focus of his work now is on the role of extracellular vesicles as therapeutic platforms, which has led to the creation of several families of novel noncoding RNA drugs with broad disease-modifying bioactivity. In 2007, Dr. Marbán became founding director of the Smidt Heart Institute, a multidisciplinary entity which brings together adult and pediatric cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, imaging specialists and researchers to foster discovery and enhance patient care. Among the honors Dr. Marbán has received are the Basic Research Prize of the American Heart Association (AHA), the Research Achievement Award of the International Society for Heart Research, the Gill Heart Institute Award and the Distinguished Scientist Awards of the AHA and the American College of Cardiology.